1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a process based on application of a superconductor or high (critical) temperature superconductor ((HT) superconductor) to an external force generated by a field selected from the group consisting of an electric field, a magnetic field, an electromagnetic field and a gravitational field and to control the resulting heat balance by accommodating an energy excluding diffusion of said energy from or into an environment of said process thereby overcoming the rudimentary state-of-the-art of the first generation of (HT) superconductor-based devices by using at least one closed vessel having at least one valve, wherein the at least one closed vessel is designed to isolate a liquid chill agent of the at least one superconductor and a chill gas atmosphere coexisting with said liquid chill agent from an external atmosphere during said application. The process is optionally designed to be operated under isolation from heat conduction from environmental objects into the at least one closed vessel or dewar by levitation exploring the diamagnetism of the at least one superconductor. Energy accommodated is released stepwise by way of a partial chill gas mass per unit operating time or per operating time intervall, i.e. xcex4dmV0/xcex4t. The invention allows to render a true service based on process-oriented technological solutions for the control of the heat balance of a true life application of a (HT) superconductor-based process.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Processing exploring the unique properties of an (high temperature) supraconductor ((HT) superconductor) has yet been limited to the triviality of a loading procedure of liquid nitrogen or derivatives (denoted as LN2 in the following) into a metal box as to the regular water intake of a steam-driven locomotive in the old days (cf. U.S. Pat. No. 5,375,531, col. 10, lines 60 to 66): xe2x80x9cBy means of cooling medium feed stations installed along a track, . . . cooling medium feed can be simple by a flow of drops . . . xe2x80x9d). That is: processing (HT) superconductor-based application is yet as simple as xe2x80x9ca comparatively simple structure of a combination of magnets and superconductors and complicated magnetic field control for supporting levitation is not required.xe2x80x9d (see U.S. Pat. No. 5,375,531, col. 1, lines 42-45).
Being overwhelmed by so much simplicity, no apparatus has yet earned the credentials of allowing, providing or even facilitating a real life process based on the properties of a (HT) superconductor. A single apparatus has yet not advanced to a process (cf. independent claims 1, 2, 4, 6 and 8 of U.S. Pat. No. 5,287,026) as much as a combination of three or even more devices can not stand a chance for a process based on application of a superconductor just by having certain features (independent claims 1, 18, 19, 20 and 22 of U.S. Pat. No. 5,375,531). Features are yet limited to having a xe2x80x9ccooling devicexe2x80x9d (cf. claim 1 in U.S. Pat. No. 5,287,026) or xe2x80x9cmeans of coolingxe2x80x9d (dependent claim 7 in U.S. Pat. No. 5,375,531) to eventually assure that more than one superconductor (element) becomes coolable independently (independent claim 22 of U.S. Pat. No. 5,375,531).
Prior art does not consider to subject a (HT) superconductor to sustainable real life applications. As shall be analyzed below toward a first (HT) superconductor-based processing on record, the maintenance of the unique state of superconductivity (which represents the number one condition for any (HT) superconductor-based processing) versus any incoming heat energy, dQi, has yet been compensated for by exploring the enthalpy of evaporation of LN2, xcex94HV This follows the relationship xcexa3dQi=xcex94HV and it is hence only consequent that not a single origin of dQi in running a (HT) superconductor-based apparatus has yet been disclosed with or without teaching ambiguities about processing conditions involved. The discussion of prior art in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,287,026 and 5,375,531 themselves reveals the limited depth of corresponding inventions.
Hitachi disclose five embodiments (U.S. Pat. No. 5,287,026) of a superconducting magnetic levitation apparatus comprising evaporation into an undefined environment X of a liquid cooling agent to chill a high temperature superconductor ((HT) superconductor) below critical temperature Tc, wherein said environment comprises a track having one or more permanent magnets for the movement of said apparatus. One embodiment discloses a vacuum chamber which is kept by a refrigerating machine at a temperature below the critical temperature Tc of said (HT) superconductor so that the operating conditions of said chamber are directly coupled to the operating conditions of said chill agent for maintenance of an illdefined superconducting state of said apparatus accommodated by said chamber and vice versa. For example, one can not exclude the environment of the (HT) superconductor chill system to contain a partial over- or underpressure due to excessive escape of corresponding chill agent or oxygen from said apparatus, wherein said partial over- or underpressure can exceed a critical thresholds for controlling a process based on said apparatus. This holds particular true because there was no disclosure of a pressure or temperature of a non-condensed material which both form important variables for processing under any conditions, whether non-adiabatic or adiabatic and being subjected to real requirements or wishful thinking.
For example, an open box containing LN2 or a chilled system exposed to an undefined environment X does not provide an adiabatic apparatus, whether this apparatus comprises insulating shielding or not (see U.S. Pat. No. 5,375,531, col. 14, line 47). Also in U.S. Pat. No. 5,375,531, the embodiments require LN2 to be dropped naturally into an open box accommodating (HT) superconductor in order to assure that a levitation body can run for many hours. The embodiments by Hitachi represent very impractical solutions for a process in real life in which usually an operation was required to be performed under a controlled atmosphere or at an ambient temperature or employing both options independent on the boundary conditions required to accommodate said apparatus by an atmosphere, whether said atmosphere is accommodated itself by an additional chamber or not. The bottom line of (HT) superconductor-processing to date is that an apparatus exploring supraconductivity has yet to accomplish a service despite its apparent simplicity which rather misleads interpretations associated with the apparatus. One has to ask, for example, how such a service can be rendered in view of an open box declared as being adiabatic but effectively representing everything else but adiabatic conditions (see col. 14, line 47 of U.S. Pat. No. 5,375,531).
Accordingly, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,287,026 and 5,375,531 are limited to either (i) short effective operating times or (ii) extended operating times in both of which the operating costs increase excessively with operating time and operating capacity because they are directly coupled with the excessive loss of the chill agent or removal thereof or with an excessively limited performance such as in a conventional vacuum chamber or with an increase in investment for (eg. vacuum) pump station equipment required to provide an excess in pumping speed with regard to a conventional counterpart or with a combination thereof, all representing extremely unrelated methods to compensate for an introduction of an energy into the superconductor or its chill system. Also, the operating heat flow remained obscured or undefined in prior art.
An alternative embodiment in U.S. Pat. No. 5,287,026 incorporates an (HT) superconductor to form a track surrounded by flow channels for a cooling liquid or gaseous chill agent in order to use a magnet as a floating body, for example. However, the apparatus was not disclosed to comprise a protection against loss of chill agent during transport and resulting increase of operating costs. Such a protection would have been essential to define boundary conditions for a viable exploration of (HT) superconductor by processing such as via levitation and carrying a load to circumvent current standstill in the development of (HT) superconductor-based processing.
The embodiments provided by U.S. Pat. No. 5,287,026 are subjected to unrealistic boundary conditions in a more demanding process because the chill system is an open system resulting in (i) high operating costs for a chill agent of the (HT) superconductor employed, (ii) high investment costs for (HT) superconductor-tracks since (HT) superconductor are rate-controlling in the amortization of any (HT) superconductor-based process or apparatus, (iii) high cost to maintain lateral stability xcex4(dz)/xcex4t-- greater than O via permanent magnets conducting environmental heat (eg. afforded by convection) into the chill system (n.b. any magnetic field gradient dB/dz toward infinite is as good as the superconducting magnetic levitation apparatus assigned to accommodate said gradient and resulting heat introduced into a superconductor moving magnetic inhomogeneities) and (iv) limited performance including limited operating times resulting from the lack of insulation or environmental control or controllable boundary conditions and which dictate magnetic field gradients dB/dz as the ultimate solution to minimize and limit external heat input into the (HT) superconductor carrier system as a result of in-homogeneities of the magnetic field being traversed by said carrier system.
The following documents disclose closed cooling systems including those of a superconductor, but without comprising a levitation or employing a thermal control of said cooling system beyond an unrelated cooling gas:
JP 62085412 (1987) by J. Yoshihiro of Mitsubishi Electric Corp. discloses a cooling device allowing for independent thermal loading and heat absorption per superconductive coil by decoupling two different coils in an individual tank for each coil and using a common liquid source in one tank coupled to both coils. Evaporated cooling agent is released to the internal atmosphere above common liquid by an internal gate to compensate for pressure loss there. The evaporated cooling agent could then also be released to an environment through a gravity check valve and an emergy discharge pipe from said cooling device, but no information was disclosed how to run the discharging operation. No information is available on the thermal behaviour of the device with time, either, such as upon release of energy to the environment via a form of a cooling agent.
JP 10135029 (1998) by S. Eiji of Railway Technical Research Institute discloses two release valves for alternating inner pressure control above a cooling liquid in two storage tanks coupled by a passage in order to move by pressure-induced pushing a cooling liquid through said passage, since an object to be cooled is located externally on a surface of said passage. The operation to discharge the gaseous chill agent from a chamber comprising a liquid chill agent is run in such a way that one of the two release valves is triggered to allow corresponding level of liquid cooling agent in one of the storage tanks to increase and become higher than that in a second storage tank before this operation is repeated by the other of the two release valves connected to the second storage tank and comprising the relatively low pressure or higher level of liquid cooling agent. No teaching is provided, however, how to quantify mass or energy stored in the storage tanks between alternating openings or when being released or when stored elsewhere while being released from one or more of said storage tanks. Accordingly, no information is available on the thermal behaviour of the device with time, either, such as upon release of energy to the environment via a form of a cooling agent.
In addition to JP 10135029, JP 10132433 (1998) by S. Eiji of Railway Technical Research Institute discloses an additional cooling chamber to recuperate and eventually reliquefy the evaporated gas over a third liquid which is then being forced by gravity back into a tank comprising the lower of the two inner pressures of the two storage tanks (cf. discussion of JP 10135029 above). The refrigerant passage for the object to be cooled is thus continuously fed in conjunction with a reciprocating up and down in height of liquid and underpressure, respectively, in said two storage tanks. However, there is no information on the thermal behaviour of the storage tanks with time such as upon release of cooling agent to the additional cooling chamber and elsewhere or how to control this thermal behaviour inside the pressurized and depressurized storage tanks with time.
It was interesting to note that JP 08189716 (1996) by M. Shinobu of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. discloses adiabatic expansion of helium gas used to cool a magnetic body via cooling the temperature of said helium gas while being separated from a superconductor immersed in a liquid chill agent, but no gas release operation was disclosed for a thermal control of said superconductor and its liquid cooling system with time. In such a system, a superconductor can only be chilled by employing a gas release should an artificial cooling via external heat extraction thus inverted heat conduction be avoided.
Accordingly, the state-of-the-art on record does not disclose a thermal control of a superconductor with time by a release of a chill agent from a closed system accommodating said superconductor in a superconductive state in a liquid chill agent and which would require a mass balance of the constituents of said cooling system. Also the more recent developments for superconductor based bearings in fly wheel (spinning) energy storage systems do not disclose a teaching how to operate the energy exchange of a cooling system comprising a superconductor toward long term thermally controlled application of a superconductive state (see WO97 09664). This applies in particular to a levitating apparatus exploring the diamagnetic behaviour of a superconductor and resulting insulation from heat conduction into corresponding chill system from an environment of said chill system.